The Maimed (Survival Spaces Rewrite)
by yearofsilence
Summary: MI6 operative Finn McMissile's lover has been killed in the line of duty. Or so he thinks. Finn/Leland, humanized.
1. I

_**content warning: suicidal thoughts **_

This was always one of the hard parts of Patrice Shiftwell's job, dealing with this sort of thing: The inevitable killing or maiming of field agents. Today was especially hard for her. Leland Turbo had been with MI6 for decades.

And he wasn't dead yet. There was no finality to fall back on. Instead, he was lying comatose in a private hospital room, severely injured on an undercover mission. Patrice hadn't seen him yet, but she was about to. They'd just brought him back to the UK a few days ago. She sighed as she opened the door to his room, knowing there could be nothing good on the other side.

But knowing beforehand didn't prepare her for the awful sight in front of her. Nor did a lifetime of seeing corpses. A gasp escaped her as she took in the sight of him.

There was barely anything left of him, to be honest. His face was swollen and bandaged, and his arms were bandaged as well. He was on a ventilator, and his legs...

His legs had been amputated above the knees. Both of them. He had been attacked, tortured, left for dead -and then rescued by an American agent who had been instructed to not inform Finn McMissile, Leland's partner, of his survival. The concern was that having him worrying about Leland throughout the mission would compromise Finn even further than grieving on the job would. Patrice knew he had to be grieving, even if he was hiding it. Leland and Finn had been partners for their entire careers, even training together. She sat down in the chair next to Leland's bed, sighing.

"Well, at least no one can hurt you now..." She looked sadly at the man. He was deeply unconscious, and Shiftwell knew she was talking to no one. This hit very close to home for her -not only had she been a field agent herself, her niece Holley was now one too -Finn's new field partner, in fact. Patrice was worried. If Finn had a breakdown...

Holley could end up just like this. Or dead. So could Finn.

She had faith in Finn, though. He'd been a good agent all these years, these decades. She looked again at Leland, sighing.

"I hope you're not in too much pain right now."

* * *

Finn McMissile was in immense pain. His field partner was dead. His boyfriend was dead -that's what Leland really was, behind MI6's back. And yet, he still had to continue on working. As if nothing had happened. MI6 had already replaced Leland with a young woman named Holley. They had to rendezvous with the American agent they'd met at the World Grand Prix opening party last night. Finn sat on the bed in his hotel room, all alone. Just like he had been these past few days. All alone, at least emotionally. He still had to deal with everyone around him in actuality. No one knew how gutted this suave British agent was inside.

He could honestly just kill himself right now. Never in his thirty plus years as a field agent had he ever thought like that before. He had always felt that you were never more alive than when you were almost dead. Leland had felt the same way.

And now look at him! Brutally murdered! What a lie they had told themselves over the years, all the times they laughed off being almost killed!

He realized, as he looked out the window to the sun rising over the Tokyo skyline early in the morning, that he could not die just yet. He still had this mission. He... He could not even allow himself to escape his own pain. Not yet. How awful.

He wished he could just let go and shoot himself dead. Instead, he trudged to the bed and collapsed with a scream, crying into the sheets hysterically. Leland was dead. What would become of Finn now?

Nothing. Because Finn would be dead after this mission. He didn't even care if it was by his own hands or Zündapp's. The old Finn would have wanted to die honorably in action, if he had to die.

This Finn just wanted to die by any means necessary. Leland had made the ultimate sacrifice. And so had Finn, in a way. Both Finn and Leland, actually -they had sacrified having normal lives a long time ago. They only had each other. Friendships were risky in this line of work. Fraternization was forbidden. But here Finn was, mourning his field partner as a dead lover.

He always kind-of knew that his relationship could end badly at any moment like this. But to have that actually happen felt unreal.

Unreal. That's what these last few days had felt like for Finn. Leland was gone -Finn had seen his corpse. His murderers, two of Zündapp's workers, had brought out Leland's bloody, pulverized, _ruined_ body to show their boss. It would forever be an image burned into Finn's mind.

There was no way he could live any semblance of a normal life after this. He was going to kill himself after this mission, because otherwise he'd probably have a breakdown and be locked away in a mental hospital forever. This... This had broken him. It had took a long time, but they had finally broken Finn. This was it. He'd been conquered, defeated, destroyed, broken...

All he wanted was Leland. That was all he had ever wanted. If he couldn't get it in life he'd get it in death. Neither man had any family, really. All they had were each other. He'd have himself buried next to Leland. He'd do something.

Oh shit! MI6 was going to bury Leland at sea! Finn let out a wail, realizing this. He'd get back to London and throw himself off a bridge, then.

But then they'd just fish his corpse out of the River Thames. No, he didn't have to kill himself like that. All he had to do was get buried at sea. He smiled at the thought of him and Leland dead at the bottom of the ocean together. No more work. No more thoughts. No more grief. No more pain. Just nothing.

Or maybe there was an afterlife. They'd be together forever, either way. Finn got up and looked out the window, watching the sun rise over the Tokyo skyline. He smiled grimly, not at the actual sight of it, but at the thought of the sun _setting_ on his own life. This was it it. If this was the end of Leland Turbo, then it was the end of Finn McMissile, too.

Little did he know that this was far from the end for both men.


	2. II

It was over. Zündapp had been arrested. So had his boss, the disgraced Miles Axlerod. The two men who had killed Leland... one of them was dead, the other missing. The former had been beaten to death, almost looking a little like Leland in death. They'd actually captured Finn during the mission, tying him along with two others to the machinery inside Big Bentley. They'd all almost died.

To make things worse, the two men -Grem and Ace- had taunted Finn about Leland. They'd beaten him. Then threw him into a trash compactor. Then pulled his corpse out of it. That's why his body was so broken. As broken as Finn emotionally was.

He hadn't killed himself, but he was pretty sure as soon as MI6 picked up on how traumatized he was, he'd be let go. Somehow they hadn't yet. But he knew he was. Everything got to him in ways it hadn't before. He was kept up at night, now expecting someone from a past mission to come and kill him at any time. He'd made lots of enemies over his long, illustrious career. He was driving to work and a driver had cut in front of his Aston Martin -he had nearly died on the spot. Outside of work he just shut himself inside his flat now -not that he was ever that sociable before. That had always been Leland's job. Right now, he was lying in bed, knowing he was probably going to call in sick to work today. Again. He hadn't slept in two days. He kept having this, these episodes of insomnia. After a couple days during one he just felt braindead. Maybe he just always was now, mentally fried by Leland's death. Maybe it would be better if he got fired. Move somewhere far away from London. It would be his first time moving out of the city. He'd been all around the world many times for work, but he had always remained here in his regular life. He had been born in the East End, and he had kept the accent despite being advised early in his career that it would hold him back.

And then they had brought Leland in from up north, and suddenly Finn's accent was only the second worst in their opinion. By the time Leland was killed it had softened, but back then...

Completely unintelligible. He was from Liverpool, and he was the first Scouser Finn had ever met in his life. Immediately Finn disliked him. The thick accent, the cocky attitude, the way he carried himself...

Both of them had grown up working class, but Leland had always carried himself differently than Finn. If he had grown up more privileged he probably would have gone to an art school somewhere.

Instead he ended up in the military like Finn, only less willingly. Both of them had then ended up at MI6. Finn was the introverted one, quiet and retreating in his personal life. At work he was the perfect suave British agent, like you'd see in a James Bond film -at least until he opened his mouth. Leland didn't even try to fit that stereotype, rather, he made the role fit him. Finn hated that at first but over the years, as Finn himself grew more confident, it become one of the best things about Leland.

There were so many wonderful things about Leland. He had been great with women, something Finn was lacking in. What no one knew back then was that there had been a reason for Finn being so gun-shy around them.

He didn't like them. No, not in the sense of having issues towards women or being angry with them, but rather in the sense of never being attracted to them. The only people Finn had ever felt that way towards... were other men. It had started when he was very young. A classmate older just by a year. Finn never spoke a word to the other boy, but that had been his first crush. Throughout his late childhood and adolescence he had been waiting for that moment when it would be a girl that would make him feel that way, and all the things he had rehearsed in his head with various male crushes would become applicable to the real world, the _normal_ world.

He realized at a certain point that day would never come. He left denial and entered the closet. He had been partnered with Leland for a few years, having long moved past his initial apprehension towards the man, when they were sent to Hong Kong. They had both been so young. Finn hadn't even gone grey yet -his once honey-blonde hair had faded away in his thirties.

He thought back to that night. Leland and him had been waiting in a nightclub for an informant, but the man never came. Towards the end of the night, with no one watching them, Leland kissed Finn.

And Finn kissed back. They gave up waiting for the informant after that. Finn still vividly remembered Leland driving him back to the hotel, with Hong Kong's neon lights shining through the rain.

_"I'm sorry, Finn." Finn, lost in thought, snapped back to reality._

_"For what?" Leland gave him a sort-of "you know what" look. Finn's face shifted a little._

_"No, it's fine, Leland, I-"_

_"It's unprofessional, and I'm sorry. Stella and me just broke up and I guess-"_

_"Leland." Finn made eye contact with the visibly embarrassed man, eerily lit up by the yellow glow of a neon light. Finn gave him a slight smile._

_"I... I enjoyed it, Leland. You know... there's a reason why I'm never with girls." _

_"Finn..." Leland was a little surprised that Finn wasn't angry with him. He was also surprised that Finn was gay. Leland turned into a dark parking garage and put the car -Finn's Aston Martin- in park._

_"Finn, I know the agency doesn't even want field partners to be friends, but I... I think I love you, Finn." Finn blushed._

_"And I've been trying to hold it back, because they'd have my arse for it. So I thought having a bird would stop me, but I couldn't lie to Stella anymore, 'cos she wanted to get married and I just cannot have a bloody wife and live a lie forever. I didn't have it in me to marry a straight woman while being... gay." Leland looked down._

_"Finn, I was leaving Stella every morning and coming into work and just. Just thinking about how I wanted to have you instead of her. And she started naggin' me about getting married and I told meself, 'Leland, you can't do this to her. She deserves romance'. So I broke it off." Leland sighed._

_"The agency's gonna kill me for this." Leland looked straight ahead at the rain, with Finn looking right at him, taking him in as if he had never seen the other man before. Leland was attractive, stockier than the bony, gaunt Finn. His titian red hair was shaved on the sides, and he had a mustache, although his was shorter and thicker than Finn's. He was wearing little tiny gold rings in his ears, and in context now, Finn could tell he was gay. _

_"Not if we hide it, they won't." Leland turned to face Finn._

_"What?" _

_"Secrets are part of our job, Leland."_

_"I never thought I'd see the day I'd hear you talk about going behind MI6's back."_

_"And I never thought I'd see the day I'd find the one I love." _

Finn jolted upright, hearing his phone ring. He picked jt up.

"Hello?"

"A Karmann Ghia has no radiator." The posh voice on the other end replied -it was Holley, Leland's replacement.

"That's because it's air-cooled." He quickly answered in his own working-class accent.

"Finn?" Finn must have been running late again. Maybe they were going to discipline him -or finally fire him.

"You must come to St. George's Hospital." Finn's face contorted in confusion.

"What? Why?"

"MI6 wanted you to hear it from me, so... they said your old field partner is here, and they're going to let you see him."

"Holley, my dear, Leland passed away. Whoever's there, they've been mixed up with him."

"No, it is him, I swear! MI6 brought me in to look at him, it's really Agent Turbo." Finn sighed.

"He's dead."

"They told me an American agent evacuated him from the oil rig the night you came to rescue him."

"I saw his body, Holley." Holley hung up, only to text Finn a minute later. She had send Finn a photo of a man lying in a hospital bed, unconscious and severely injured. Finn's heart sank as he realized he recognized him immediately.

It was Leland.


	3. III

Holley stared at her phone screen, waiting for a reply from Finn. She was sitting outside Leland's room in a little plastic chair, just waiting. It had been a weird day for her, and it was only morning. Her phone lit up with a text.

_On my way _

Holley sighed. She had never known Leland, and seeing him like this was still hard for her. She couldn't imagine how Finn felt.

There was one chilling factor that Finn didn't have to deal with however -this was her. She was Finn's new field partner. She hadn't even joined MI6 as a field agent, she was originally just working analytics in Tokyo. She had been quite literally thrust into the high-stakes world of espionage, and the unconscious figure lying in bed was a warning to her of what she would become if she slipped up. It hadn't really hit her before, even after getting captured and tied up inside Big Bentley -maybe because then, her adrenaline was pumping. This was just on a regular day, where Holley had the luxury of being able to sit there and realize that now that she was seeing action, she could end up just like poor Leland Turbo. Or worse -the American agent who had rescued Leland was the one who was supposed to rendezvous in Tokyo with Finn and her. He was missing and presumed dead.

With this in mind, she re-entered the room and gently sat down in the chair next to Leland's bed, deciding to watch him until Finn arrived. The noisy life support machines didn't drown out her anxious thoughts, however. What if this last mission's success was just a fluke? What if she turned out to be terrible at this? What if she ended up like this way earlier in her career before Leland had in his? She looked at his face. He must have healed up a little since his rescue, as her aunt Patrice had described him as unrecognizable when they brought him in, while now, his face was just a little bit swollen and bruised. They'd taken away the bandages that had originally obscured his scalp and face, and looking closely at him, Holley realized he was quite good-looking. Finn was older-looking and rather pretty -Leland looked younger... and downright handsome. She blushed a little, thinking about how inappropriate of a time this was to be sizing him up, but she had just broken up with an American she'd met during her first field mission, and...

She gave him a little tiny kiss on the cheek. There was something really charming about him, even while he was battered and intubated.

"Women always did find him irresistible." A voice piped up from behind, and Holley turned to face a woman around Leland's age, slightly heavyset with dyed blonde hair.

"Who -Who are you?" The woman smiled at Holley.

"I'm Stella, Leland's ex-fiance." Holley blushed further.

"I am so sorry, I let myself get carried away, I-"

"It's alright, love, I made me peace with Leland a long time ago." She had a thick regional accent -Scouse, Holley realized. The younger woman's face was still glowing pink from embarrassment.

"No, I am so sorry, I really am-" Stella chuckled.

"It doesn't matter if you kiss him, dear, he's gay." Holley's eyebrows raised. She thought that Stella had been implying Leland was unfaithful.

"He is?"

"It's why he left me. We were going to get married, and he told me he couldn't go through with it, 'cos he was gay. But he kept me as his emergency contact, so even though I've long moved on with me life, got married to a straight man an' had a couple kids, they called me when he got hurt."

"You came down here all the way from Liverpool?" Stella shook her head.

"I've been living in London the past ten years, even met up with Leland to catch up a few times. I didn't ever think this would happen to him." Holley's phone vibrated.

_I'm almost_ _there_

Holley looked back up at Stella.

"Leland's partner is here. I'm sorry, but I think you're going to have to leave. I'm sure you know that his job is heavily... classified." Stella was giving Holley a playful smirk.

"Alright, I'll go. For security reasons. Have a nice day, love..." She left the room, closing the door behind her. Holley stared at the door, waiting for Finn.

* * *

Finn drove as fast as he could through London traffic, intent on getting to Leland as fast as possible. He had been so convinced that Leland was dead... he'd left him behind. He had looked so terrible, Finn was certain he had died. Zündapp seemed to think he was dead. So did the thugs who had brutalized him. The image of Leland's broken body was still burned into Finn's mind, but now it shared space with the photo Holley had sent Finn, the one of Leland on life support in a hospital. At least his face was recognizable, because on the oil rig, he had been so badly beaten that it had left his "corpse" disfigured. His face... you could barely tell it was a man, much less Leland.

It had burned him inside, the American mechanic that had accompanied Finn rather on accident calling Holley his girlfriend over and over. To lie awake every night, thinking about the love of his life tortured to death, only to hear some redneck throw around the word "girlfriend" over and over the next day was almost torture itself. When Holley had broken up with him just a few days later, Finn had to stifle a smirk.

He'd lost a part of himself with Leland. It was Leland who had sort-of brought Finn to life in the first place. Finn had been so insecure when he was first recruited. His confidence, the suave air about him... that was all Leland. Leland brought out everything good in Finn. Finn thought all of that had retreated back inside when Leland was killed. He had been so numb recently.

The knighting ceremony for the American had been brutal. Finn wanted to shoot himself, not watch someone celebrate. Especially since he did, actually, feel guilty about his animosity towards the man. After all, it was Finn himself who had roped the poor bloke into this. Distracted by his grieving, he had mistook the American for an agent, unwilling to accept the man's pleas that he was, in fact, just a mechanic. But to watch someone get up to such ridiculous antics when his boyfriend had been thrown into a trash compactor and crushed alive was agonizing. So he had rationalized it as being some fantastic act by a veteran agent. Kept it to himself. No one had realized what a wreck Finn was.

Secrets were a part of the job, after all.

How he missed Leland sorely, though. Leland was more fun than anyone Finn had ever met. They were the perfect couple. Finn looked forward to field missions, getting shipped off somewhere exotic with the man he would have married in a heartbeat if he could. With Leland, Finn felt emotions he never had before...

Whenever Finn could spend time with Leland outside of MI6, it was amazing. They had once taken a trip to America together, in 1999 for New Year's. They had gone to Times Square and kissed as the new millennium began.

Finn started to get lost his thoughts, only to get brought back sharply to reality by a car honking at him. He continued driving with a certain intent the average commuter lacked, but at a red light, he stopped to text Holley.

_I'm almost there_

* * *

Holley had zoned out a little, staring blankly at the door instead of Leland. Such a weird encounter... Stella must have been notified as soon as Leland was brought back to the UK. She turned back around to face him, still embarrassed from kissing him. So he was gay... and still had his ex-fiance as his emergency contact? An ex-fiance who seemed convinced Leland had a boyfriend? That didn't sit right with Holley. Where was the boyfriend? She wished she would have pressed Stella for some information instead of kicking her out, but she had been so embarrassed, and MI6 probably wouldn't want Stella to meet Finn anyways.

But still... she was burning with curiosity. Perhaps Finn could shine some light on this -after all, he had been Leland's field partner for ages. She turned back to the unconscious figure in bed, only to turn back around at the sound of someone entering the room. It was Finn, like she'd never seen him before. His gray hair was messy, his sharkskin suit replaced with baggy, dark-colored street clothes, and he wore round wire-framed glasses instead of the contacts she'd seen him put in on their last mission. Like this, he looked older... and sadder.

"How is he, Holley?" Finn sounded nervous. Holley said nothing, still in shock at his transformation over the last couple weeks -or rather, degradation. She hadn't seen Finn in person since Mater, the American, was knighted. He kept shutting himself in his office or calling in sick. She wasn't able to see how upset he was during the mission, but now... it was obvious.

"He's sedated, Finn. But it looks like he's recovering nicely... at least, to me it does..." Holley's voice trailed off. Finn took off the black ski jacket he was wearing and placed it on a table as he walked over to Leland.

"Did they tell you anything else? You're the only person who's so far told me anything, Holley."

"No, but I took a look at his chart, and-"

"Good thinking, Holley." His voice was flat and tired-sounding. Holley had heard a little bit of that in his voice during the mission, but she had chalked it up to the mission being so stressful. Finn picked up the chart, and she watched helplessly as his already pale face went whiter. She knew exactly what it was. Leland was a double amputee.

"Finn?" He didn't respond.

"Finn, I'm sorry. They told me not to tell you that over the phone-"

"It's okay, Holley..." He sighed, continuing to look through the chart. His face fell even further.

"It's a miracle he's alive..." Holley nodded. They sat in silence for a moment before Holley spoke.

"Finn, there was this woman in here... she was Leland's ex-fiance from back in the day." Finn suddenly looked up at her.

"Stella? What was she doing here?"

"She was Leland's emergency contact..."

"After all these years?" Holley nodded. Finn looked down and sighed. He had always thought he was Leland's emergency contact, as stupid as that was. Maybe he had just made himself believe that because he wanted it, as impractical as it would be. It made perfect sense for Leland to have a civilian instead of Finn, but... Finn had thought that Leland, knowing Leland, would have put him down instead of Stella.

Maybe having her down instead was Finn rubbing off on Leland, that sort of practical-mindedness. Finn looked back up at Holley.

"Leland stopped having relationships after his career took off. He was too busy. He probably wrote her name down years and years ago and never found anyone to replace it." Holley looked straight at him.

"She told me he was gay." This conversation was making Finn tense, or at least more tense than he already was.

"Oh, really? I had always wondered -as field partners, we generally don't talk about one another's personal lives." He was hinting at Holley to lay off him, but she wouldn't. She was too inquisitive.

"Stella seemed to think he actually had found someone else."

"Well I wouldn't know anything about it!" Finn snapped, shutting Holley down.

"I don't know what you think you're getting at by pressing me with these questions! We were field partners, coworkers!" Holley knew now. Finn wouldn't get defensive like this for no reason.

Leland and Finn had been having a relationship behind MI6's back. She didn't say anything else, just nodded.

"I'm... I'm sorry, Finn." He sighed.

"I'd like to be alone with him, Holley. This is very painful for me to see, and I just... I need to be alone with him." She smiled and nodded once more, getting up and grabbing her purse.

"I'll see you later, Finn."

"Goodbye, Holley." She exited, her block-heeled boots making a clicking noise. Finn turned back to Leland once the door closed. Leland... looked like himself again. His hair was still the same, long on the top with cropped sides like Finn's. His face looked alright except for the bruising, which was almost healed up anyways. His nose was a little bit crooked, but nothing horribly disfiguring.

But there had been something on the chart besides the amputations that worried Finn. Leland had sustained a bad head injury, and that's why he had been placed in a medically induced coma. Amputations... you knew what the prognosis was for that. It was final. Leland had lost his legs and survived it. But brain damage? So much more uncertainty. What if Leland never woke up? What if he was never the same? What if Finn had lost him regardless if he was technically alive or not? There was nothing he could do but wait and see. He sat down in the chair next to Leland's bed where Holley had been sitting.

Holley. He realized he had given himself away. Holley knew. That's why she had laid off, because he had told her all she needed to know. He'd admit it... as a field partner, she made a pretty good replacement for Leland. She was a brilliant young woman, cunning and in the prime of her life. But no one could replace Leland outside of work for Finn. This was the only man he could ever see himself with. There was simply no one else at this point, after all these decades with him. Finn reached out and took Leland by the hand. Unable to hold it in anymore, and with Holley gone, he broke down in tears.

* * *

_**A/N: i'm not entirely happy with the ending of this chapter but honestly i've been struggling a lot to get this one published so i feel like it's better to just keep moving with this story than to get stuck on one paragraph and abandon it for months, so here you guys go :)**_


	4. IV

**_A/N: so a little note on finn and leland's accents_**

**_leland is not canonically scouse. however his VA, jason isaacs, is from liverpool and later dropped the accent. since he voiced both leland and siddeley i thought it would be kinda cool to give leland that regional accent to differentiate between their voices_**

**_finn however is canonically cockney. sometimes i run across fics where his accent is described as "posh" and that's not true. neither finn nor his VA michael caine (who is from london's east end) speak in received pronunciation (AKA the posh accent), and RP actually sounds a lot different than how finn speaks_**

* * *

They'd put Finn on paid leave, both to be nice and because he wasn't fit for duty at the moment. He was going to spend it holding vigil at Leland's bedside. This was day three. Leland was still anesthetized, unaware of Finn's presence. It was 12:00. He'd been at the hospital since 9:00. He didn't intend on leaving anytime soon.

Finn had bought Leland a bouquet of black-eyed Susans, which sat in a glass vase on the nightstand. He touched a bony hand to the vibrant yellow flowers.

"Do you like them, dear?" Of course, there was no reply.

"I miss you, Leland." Once again, no reply. Finn thought back to the last time he heard Leland speak in-person. It had been when Leland had been leaving for the assignment. There was this little window of time when they had been alone at the airport, without Siddeley or anyone else around.

_"Leland." The ginger turned around to face Finn. _

_"What is it?" Finn approached him, with Leland noticeably shorter than the 6'2 agent. The taller man gave him a sort-of sad, concerned look. Finn had this... bad feeling. Sure, both Leland and Finn himself had gotten into trouble on missions before, often having to pull the other one out of danger, but this felt different to Finn. Like something awful was going to happen. He just had this feeling that this mission was going to cost Leland more than Leland thought it would._

_"Stay safe out there." Leland playfully rolled his eyes. _

_"Aw, Finn, I'll be sound. It's not like I've never had an undercover mission before."_

_"I know but, Leland, just..."_

_"I'll be alright Finn, I promise." Finn sighed and pulled him close._

_"You promise?"_

_"I promise." _Finn brought himself back to reality, looking right at Leland. So much for being alright -he was a mess. Lying broken in a hospital bed, permanently out of commission...

There was simply no way Leland could ever work for MI6 again, especially not as a field agent, even if he still had all his wits about him when he came to. If he came to. Finn sighed. He had to try to stay hopeful, nothing good could come out of losing it. He reached over and held Leland's hand, only to startle and let go when the door opened behind him. Standing up and turning around, he saw that it was Holley.

"Hi, Finn... I thought I'd check up on you." He gave her a slight smile.

"That's very nice of you, Holley. To be honest I could use the company." Holley was pleased to see that Finn looked more like himself and less like the disheveled, panicked older man she'd encountered a few days ago. He'd gone back to wearing contacts, and his hair was neater now, swept back a little like when she had met him in Tokyo. She moved closer until she was standing at Leland's bedside.

"How is he, Finn?"

"Pretty much the same. They haven't taken him off any of the drugs yet, so he's still... asleep..." Finn thought back to Holley finding out about the affair. He knew that she knew. He looked down at Leland, then back up at Holley.

"Holley, there's something I need to tell you." Her face grew concerned -was Leland dying?

"What -What is it, Finn?" She didn't want Leland to die. Even though she didn't know him, she wanted to see him recover so badly -he meant so much to Finn, being that they were-

"Remember how Stella told you Leland was gay?" Oh gosh, was Finn coming out to her? She tried not to look taken aback -she didn't realize Finn trusted her that much before.

"Yeah, of course. How could I forget?"

"Well, Holley, I'm going to come clean about something. I've known about Leland being gay forever. We... We were closer than MI6 would like its field agents to be." Holley silently nodded.

"Holley, you can't tell MI6 this, but Leland and me were having an affair before he got hurt." Holley nodded.

"I thought so, Finn. For how long?"

"Since 1990." Holley's heart sank. They'd been together that long... longer than some people stayed married... no wonder Finn seemed so distraught. She wasn't expecting them to have been together that long. Not that long. She looked at Leland, unconscious and maimed. It must kill Finn seeing him like this, she thought.

"I'm... I'm so sorry, Finn." He sighed, sitting back down in the chair by Leland's bedside.

"There's nothing to be sorry for, Holley. This isn't your fault."

"I know, but it's so horrible, I just can't imagine being with someone that long and-"

"I know, Holley!" Finn snapped, causing her to startle and go silent. He looked away from her, blushing a little.

"I know all too well, Holley." He took in the sight of Leland once again. Such a fun, vibrant, extroverted man now reduced to a frail figure lying unaware in a hospital bed, at least for the time being. He hoped just for the time being. How horrible it would be for Leland to be like this permanently, never opening his eyes or speaking again. What would happen then? Would Leland still die young of some complication, pneumonia or some infection doing him in? Or could he remain like this for decades, eternally sleeping like some sad fairy tale with no happy ending. That sounded worse to Finn, having to watch him spend the next few decades of his life wasting away, never getting to enjoy life after MI6. It would be as if he had died, but with no closure until he finally succumbed to something. He felt a hand on his back, and looked up to see Holley giving him a sympathetic smile.

"Do you want me to leave you alone, Finn?" He blinked slowly and sighed.

"Perhaps that would be for the best." She nodded and removed her hand from his back, then walked away.

"Holley." She stopped right in front of the door and turned back around.

"Yes?"

"Thanks for coming here to check on me." She gave him that same sympathic smile.

"It's my pleasure." She opened the door and walked out, closing it slowly behind her.

"Bye, Finn."

"Goodbye, Holley."

* * *

Siddeley peeked into the hospital room and then shut the door, apprehensive. They had told him that Leland had survived just a couple days after they'd told Finn, but he had pressed Holley for details on his condition, and had then become reluctant to see Leland in such a bad way.

"Oh Holley, I don't think I can do this." He was younger than Finn and Leland, probably just a decade older than Holley at the most. He'd told her he'd known them since before he was Holley's age. He turned to face her.

"How bad does he look? Finn won't tell me anything..." Finn wasn't actually here with Leland right now -Siddeley had wanted to see Leland alone, and so he had waited for Finn to leave. It was a long wait, actually, but finally Finn had decided to leave early one day to get some rest. It was around 5:00 PM on a Saturday.

"He looks fine, Sid. Trust me, you can do this." Sidd weakly nodded and opened the door. He slowly entered, only to run over to Leland once he saw him.

"Holley, he looks horrible!" She flinched.

"I guess I just didn't know him before, so I don't really have any frame of ref-"

"Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Because if you had known him you would see what me and Finn see." She walked up to Siddeley.

"What was he like, Sid?" He looked over at her.

"Finn's not talking much to you either, huh?" Holley shrugged her shoulders a little.

"You know how Finn seems really old and stuffy? Well, Leland was never like that. I honestly was always closer to Leland. He was really fun, really outgoing. Honestly, I think he was Finn's only real friend. I'm just a work friend, I guess you would call it. And Tomber... ehhh... he's more of a frenemy, I'd say. The only person Finn has ever pursued seeing outside of work was Leland. This whole thing with Finn seeming closed? He's always been like that. But Leland was always really charming and friendly, a really nice bloke to be around. He'd meet people and they'd hit it off right away. Seeing him like this is seeing him stripped of all that. It's so horrible, Holley, I can barely take it." He sighed.

"Honestly until he wakes up I don't think I can stand seeing him. It's really killing me, I just..."

"It's alright if you don't want to see him. They're going to be bringing him out of the coma soon anyways, so you don't even have that long to wait."

"Okay, I'm done here then. I can't look at him for one second longer." He turned away and ran off without even saying goodbye. Holley went over to the door he'd left open and shut it. She looked over at Leland and paused for a moment, then left as well, shutting the door behind her and leaving him alone in his room.


End file.
